The capacitive sensing technology has been in use for decades. However, the launch of the iPhone in 2007 initiated an explosive wave of deployment of the capacitive sensing technology. Many of today's smart phones are equipped with a capacitive touch screen. There is an increasing demand for capacitive touch screens with larger sizes and quicker response that tends to result in higher complexity and power consumption in the analog front end design. However, the number of simultaneous touches supported remains relatively unchanged. For example, for a capacitive touch keyboard, typically no more than three key combinations are expected to be entered at the same time.
Other features of the present embodiments will be apparent from the accompanying drawings and from the detailed description that follows.